What are Healing Stories?

Situations and events we don’t expect that are overwhelming are going to happen to us in our family life at one time or another. Our birth doesn’t go as planned. The beloved family dog runs away and can’t be found. We’re in a car accident. A family member is diagnosed with an illness. We have a bad day. We get angry and yell at the kids. Stuff happens. When we can integrate an overwhelming event in a safe, supported environment, we’re able to really experience and express our thoughts and feelings around the event, and complete them. This enables us to emotionally heal from whatever happened and move forward in a connected way- connected to ourselves and connected to each other.

Healing Stories involves slowing down and telling the story of the event. We naturally do a version of this when we get together with a friend and tell them about something that happened. We want to be heard, for someone to really listen and empathize or sympathize with us. If we are sad, we may want to be held while we cry, or to have someone cry with us. Participating in a group Healing Stories Circle or having a private Healing Stories Session enables you to help your child heal from trauma and also heal yourself.

Healing Stories is about:

HOPE! There is a tremendous amount of hope for healing even very traumatic events so they do not have to keep a hold on our lives.

Honesty. Be honest about what happened. Don’t hold back your feelings. They are your feelings and they deserve to be acknowledged.

Taking responsibility for something that happened.

Forgiveness. This includes forgiving others for something they may have done, as well as forgiving yourself if you have regrets.

Healing Stories is not about:

Guilt. You can take responsibility for a decision you made and regret, without continually feeling guilty about it.

Blame. You can acknowledge that someone may have acted in a way that wasn’t ok, without blaming them and holding a grudge.

Healing Stories Circles

An intimate group of parents gather together to share stories, whether about birth or a current parenting challenge, in a non-judgmental zone. Everyone works together to create a healing space and everyone has a chance to share their own story as well as to support the others as they share. The emphasis isn’t on finding a way to fix the challenge, but to create a healing space for the parent to be validated and explore their own answers in a safe space. Whether you choose to share or not, you will benefit from being in this healing space.

Healing Stories Family Sessions

Families have many reasons for seeking their own Healing Stories sessions. When a very young child is experiencing sleep or feeding challenges, is irritable, colicky, or otherwise difficult to soothe, after all medical reasons have been ruled out, the child is often trying to communicate something that we just aren’t understanding. Healing Stories sessions create the space for our very young children to integrate early experiences and create more connection in the family.

Families with older children find that challenging behaviors or a significant trauma (death in the family, separation or divorce, injury, diagnosis of serious illness for child or family member) sends families to see Rebecca, but often what is really needed is to create a healing space for the family. Rebecca supports parents in sharing their own stories first using the Healing Stories approach. Then Rebecca gives parents the tools to go back into their own homes to work with their own child (or children) to create a healing space. If the situation warrants, Rebecca can work with the whole family either in person or via Skype.

Sessions can be done in person in Palm Harbor, Florida, USA at The Consciously Parenting Project’s office near downtown. For families outside of the Tampa Bay area, Rebecca works virtually via Skype and phone.

What families are saying about Healing Stories:

After learning about Healing Stories, I now have a powerful tool for dealing with sibling rivalry. Sometimes when my kids start up with “he hit me!” or “mommmeee he’s touching me!” I feel like pulling my hair out. Instead, I can take a deep breath and use story work to calm us all and work through it not just to make it go away but to get to a better place as a family.” -Jen, Pensacola, FL“After hearing Rebecca speak at a mom’s group, we decided to immediately give {Healing Stories} a try for my son’s night terrors. Previously, he had them for months and every pediatrician and specialist we saw said it was “normal” and to deal with them until he hopefully outgrew them. We worked with Rebecca and after the first session, my son never had another night terror again. I am ever so grateful for the work we did with Rebecca!” -Susan W., Palm Harbor, FL

“When my family went to Rebecca recently, we weren’t even sure what we really needed. We just knew that things were not okay. We knew that our daughter’s behavior was probably linked to some things that were going on with another family member that were not good. We just did not know what to do about it. Through Healing Stories, we were able to get our daughter to tell us what was going on for her when she was engaging in these behaviors that had been troubling us, and what had happened to cause her to have these feelings. We were then all able to share our feelings about all of the events that had happened to lead us to that point. It was only after this experience that we were all able to begin to heal. Our family is stronger because of healing stories. An added benefit is that now we are more aware of how to handle difficult situations that come up. Every person will encounter difficulties in life, but it’s such a valuable skill to know how we can work within our family to support each other through these difficult times, and how to heal safely and in connection with one another.”Meredith and Andy, St. Pete, FL

For more information and to set up a session, please contact rebecca@consciouslyparenting.com using the subject “Healing Stories Session.”

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